Return To Me
by ponywatcher
Summary: The ones we love never truly leave us - and sometimes, they come back from the dead. Featuring sassy elves, reckless dwarves and dimension holes in the middle of Croydon. Oh, and Thranduil with a green umbrella Mai Tai. Post BotFA world with some of the real world intermixed.
1. Chapter 1

**RETURN TO ME**

Chapter 1

He opened his eyes, and saw stars.

At first he had no idea what they were. The deeper parts of his mind were aware of the cold and dark that surrounded him, the dampness under his back, the chill that seeped into his nose and froze the breath that emerged. He blinked, and once satisfied that he had blinked properly – he had eyelids, they worked, and more importantly, he could _see_ – he made a larger effort to move. His muscles ached, a deep grumbling agony born of ages of disuse. His mind considered this and relented. He flexed a finger here, wiggled a toe there, and waited for his body to wake up as his mind had.

The smell of wood, of wet earth, and the soft damp under his fingertips – he was probably in some kind of forest, or wood. There were shadows curving above him, branches like arms reaching to the sky. Far above them, the stars shone a cold blue. Something stirred in his chest, but he wasn't sure what it was.

The little man sat up slowly. There was nothing around him except the trees which stood silent. The twilight was barely enough to illuminate his surroundings, but he knew he was alone. With a grunt, he struggled to his feet. His arms and legs were weighed down by armour – armour? in a forest? – and his neck felt the weight of a massive helmet on his head. With fingers still asleep he forced it off; it clanked to the ground and hit something by his feet before bouncing to a stop some distance away. The minor exertion left the little man panting. He stared at the thing by his feet, glowing dimly in the twilight. It appeared to be a shield of some sort. The sigil on it looked deeply familiar to him. Why couldn't he remember it properly? The wood, unmoving and silent, still appeared to him as though through a fog. His head ached, and he couldn't decide if the helmet was to blame. He wondered how long he had been asleep. Then some deeper part of him wondered if _asleep_ was the correct word.

A distant bark startled him. He gasped and made a strangled noise; his vocal cords had been slow to awake, like the rest of his body. Still, the sound was loud enough to reach the edge of the trees, before the silence swallowed it up again. The little man held his breath.

The bark returned, multiplying in volume and intensity. The little man looked around in panic for a place to hide. A light had appeared in the distance; it seemed to accompany the barking. He took up the shield, wondering desperately how to escape on legs that could barely move. There was no time to run, even. The light was upon him.

* * *

"Tauriel."

Sunlight was streaming in through the window. Tauriel covered her face and turned away from it.

"Tauriel. Get up."

She ignored the voice. Part of her wondered if it was her conscience talking, but she ignored that as well.

A pillow landed on her face. She batted at it ineffectually. There was a sound of curtains being drawn, and a low, exasperated muttering. Tauriel took a deep breath and raised herself on her elbows.

There at the foot of the bed stood a very tall, very annoyed elf, holding her clothes in one hand and a wooden fork in the other.

"Good," he said. There was acid in his voice. "Finally." Before Tauriel could respond, he threw the clothes at her. "Get dressed. There's breakfast." Then he turned and stalked to the door.

"Feren," Tauriel croaked.

Feren stopped and gave her his best getting-real-tired-of-your-shit look.

"I can't, Feren," she murmured.

He snorted. "Here we go again. I swear, Tauriel, every damn day – "

Tauriel glanced at her bedside table. Propped up on its surface was a penciled portrait, framed in oak and silver. Even now, the face of the dwarf that smiled back at her struck a chord of agony deep within.

"Not today," she whispered.

Feren followed her gaze to the portrait and fought the urge to roll his eyes. Instead he drew towards the bed and sat down next to Tauriel.

"Please try," he said quietly. She couldn't look at him. There was such resignation and exhaustion in his voice that she felt even more horrible. Feren stroked her cheek gently. "Please try," he repeated. "It's been 500 years."

"499, actually," Tauriel whispered.

Feren sighed. "Yes, all right. 499. How about going outside today? Just for a moment or two? The lilies are beginning to bloom. They smell wonderful." He sniffed the air. "Can you smell them?"

Tauriel sniffed the air as well. "Feren… that smells like something's burning."

Feren leapt off the bed. "Blast it! The bacon! Get dressed, you," he threw at her, before tearing out the door.

Tauriel watched him go, clutching her dress in her hands. It was a proper Elvish gown, the kind the female royalty wore. Thranduil had had it made, along with many others like it, when he left for Valinor and left Mirkwood to Tauriel. She would have been content to stay on her own, but Thranduil would not hear of it, and so appointed Feren to stay with her. Poor Feren. She had tried, begged, pleaded, even secretly arranged for Elros to kidnap him on the eve of their departure and take him along, but it had come to naught. Feren's loyalty to Thranduil, and possibly his own pity for Tauriel in her state, in the end outweighed the desire he might have had to return to the Undying Lands. Now, all of Mirkwood lay empty, except for the two of them.

Tauriel stroked the fabric of the gown in her lap. It was a beautiful shimmery green, the kind that matched her eyes. It was delicate and lovely, and she hated it. She hated gowns, for one thing, because they forced her to behave more like a princess and less like the warrior she was. She wished they had used more colours besides green. Centuries of the same colour had rendered her delight in it somewhat strained. It would have been nice not to resemble a grasshopper quite so often. But it didn't matter to her, really, whether she was a warrior or a princess, whether she wore gowns or a uniform. Nothing really mattered to her, not anymore.

She looked at the portrait again. There he was, that adorable face, that sunny smile frozen perfectly in strokes of graphite on parchment. She could not read dwarf runes, but she knew what these said. She had traced them over so many times, whispered the name to herself so often that she wondered if somewhere, somehow, he could hear her.

Outside, the birds had begun trilling. Now that Feren had rescued his bacon, the room filled with the scent of honeysuckle (Thranduil's favourite) and jasmine (Feren's idea) and hydrangeas (a gift once from Legolas, when he still gave her gifts and cared if she was dead or alive). It had been almost a month since she had gone outdoors. She didn't want to hear birdsong, or smell flowers, or feel the sunlight. She wanted to disappear into darkness and hope to find him in it. There would be no more flowers, or birdsong, or sunlight for her beautiful boy.

Tauriel looked at her gown, then at the window. No sunlight would ever match Kili's smile.

"For you," she said to the portrait. "This day's for you."

Then she threw off the blanket, and struggled out of bed.

* * *

Somewhere else, on the floor of a similar forest, another little man sat up with a gasp.

For a moment he held his breath. His lungs, unused for centuries, strained to release the air. The muscles in his chest tightened, and the pain ironically pleased him. He exhaled heavily, and took another few deep breaths. It felt as though all around him, the world was waking up. There was sunlight on his skin and grass under his palms, and crisp spring air in his nostrils. He had never felt so happy to be awake.

_Awake_. Was that the correct word?

The little man looked around him at the forest. It was filled with a hundred shades of green, and brimming with birdsong, but there was a tension in the air too. The hairs on the back of his neck began to prickle. He had no idea what was hiding in the trees, watching him.

Very carefully, he began to get up. This was a difficult decision given the general state of his legs and their refusal to cooperate, but after several attempts he made it to his feet. His body was leaden with armour – armour? in a forest? – and a shield lay on the ground beside him. The sigil on it glinted in the sunlight, stirring memory deep within. He struggled with the thought before giving up and sinking again to his knees. He had no idea where he was, nor how he had come to be there, but the sign on the shield had begun dredging up things in the past, long forgotten and left unspoken, and the chaos in his mind would soon overwhelm him.

His lips moved to speak – his mind wanted them to – but the initial sound of his voice, long silent, was now merely a croak. "Whoo," he whispered. It was simply the hiss of air escaping. He swallowed and tried again. He wasn't going to give up. "Whoo," he said, slightly more determined. The sound of birdsong began to taper off, as though the birds too wanted to hear what he had to say.

"Who – am – I?" he said. The forest around him gradually fell silent. His question seemed unanswerable.

Then, in a burst of golden memory, he saw in his mind's eye a mountain. Journeying, long journeying; companions, faithful friends whose laughter he could hear but faces he could not see. The flame of dragon-fire, screams of death. A king, standing proud and tall with a crown upon his head. Who were they? What was he? The king smiled at him and stretched out his hand. _Fili_.

The little man's eyes flew open. He felt his chest tighten, his eyes burn with tears as the memories rushed through his mind and threatened to drown him in sorrow and loss. And then he remembered something else, like a fist of iron closing around his heart.

His brother.

"Kili," he whispered. "Where are you?"


	2. Chapter 2

**RETURN TO ME **

Chapter 2

_Kili_.

He blinked, not sure if he had heard correctly. The whisper had been just over his shoulder, but there was no one else in the clearing. He tightened his grip on the shield, wishing he could cover his face with it as well. But he was a son of Durin and Durin's folk did not flee from a fight.

"Hello?" said a voice. It seemed to accompany the barking, and the light that was now shining in his face. He felt confused by his own thoughts. Who was Durin?

"Down, boy," said the voice. It sounded distinctly feminine and unafraid. "Hello? Are you all right?"

He lowered the shield slightly and squinted at the figure approaching him. The twilight above him was quickly giving way to darkness; if it hadn't been for his unreliable legs he would have taken off into the trees. So much for being a son of Durin, whoever he was. The figure slowly came closer, a smaller dark shape bouncing beside it. It was shining a light at him, a kind of light he hadn't seen before. He struggled to speak, and ended up coughing violently.

"Oh dear," said the figure. "You seem ill. Would you like a cup of tea? What's your name?"

_Tea._ The sound of the word crashed around in his skull, and a tide of memory burst forth. Sounds, smells, images. A house in a hole in the side of a hill, a round yellow door. Food, lots and lots of it, and then suddenly none at all. Fighting in dark caverns, running for his life. Smiling faces, the laughter of his friends. A tall beautiful woman in green, who shone with the light of the stars. And a face he had known all his life. _Don't worry, I've got this_.

His knees buckled and he sank to the ground, ignoring the figure that hurried forward and murmured soothing words. A strange sound pierced the night, a howl borne of centuries of grief, and it took a while for the pain in his chest to indicate that it was he who screamed.

_Kili. Where are you?_

"There, there," said the figure. "It's all right if you're lost. You can't be far from home." She patted his back as he knelt on the ground, his face in his hands. "Why don't you come have a cup of tea, and we can call your parents to take you home?"

Home. She was wrong, he knew it for certain. His home was miles, no, centuries away.

"Kili," he whispered. The dog, who had been sniffing him eagerly, gave him a friendly lick.

"Sorry?" said the figure. She was a whole head and shoulders taller than him, and probably someone's kindly grandmother. Right now, a cup of tea sounded really, really promising.

"Kili," he said again, louder and more firmly. "My name. Is Kili."

* * *

"_How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat_

_Some dance to remember; some dance to forget…"_

The islander and his companion had been in the same corner of the café for over an hour, one talking endlessly and the other silently drinking mug after mug of cheap beer. Bron was a regular, but tonight was the first time he had met the other man, and had taken a quick liking to him, despite his general grubbiness and a strange cheeping sound that seemed to come from under his hat.

"My friend," he said to his silent companion, "do not be fooled. It looks cheap, and it's run by some very strange people, but this place is the best in the whole island." He took a swig of beer and added, "They know how to avoid being a tourist trap. They are very clever about their choice of clientele."

The quiet companion looked around the establishment. Its patrons, in varying stages of intoxication and various positions indicating such, seemed very happy about their state of affairs. The bartender, a beautiful young man who had caught the fancy of several of the patrons, mixed drinks with a ruthless efficiency and graceful movement that almost resembled dance. His fair skin suggested he was not from the island, as did his high cheekbones and lithe build. Indeed, everyone who worked at the café had the same haughty, otherworldly beauty about them, a different kind of intoxication from the one they peddled at the counter. Bron and his companion watched as the bartender slapped away a customer's pawing hand and deftly served her a martini.

"He's good," said Bron. He was beginning to slur a little. "They all are. That's the way he likes it." He pointed up at the second floor balcony which overlooked the empty dance floor. In the red-tinted shadows the companion made out a figure atop a dais, watching the activity below. The companion tensed.

"Cheap bastard," Bron said, following his companion's gaze. "But he has the best mushrooms. Have you tried the mushrooms here?"

The companion watched the figure flick his hand toward the door of the balcony. Another figure detached itself from the shadows and headed to the door, descending the steps to where they were.

"I've had mushrooms," said the companion. Bron was now sprawled on the table, snoring. The companion patted his head gently and went over to the bar.

The man who had come down the steps was as beautiful as the bartender. His long dark hair was not up in a ponytail like the bartender's blond locks, but he wore the same loose-fitting shirt and silver bracelet around his wrist. The companion took an inconspicuous seat and watched him whisper to the bartender, who nodded. Then he walked directly toward him. The companion felt himself grow smaller as the man's gaze scrutinized his face.

"Come," he said, holding out his hand. His voice was kind, but the companion could hear the echo of steel in it.

They walked to the stairs, the man taking a Mai Tai from the bartender as they went, and climbed the steps to the balcony, to the figure still seated on the dais. The neon lighting in the signboard above the bar flickered slightly, then remained steady. It read MIRKWOOD MUSHROOM CAFÉ &amp; BAR.

* * *

"You've put mushrooms in this," Tauriel said. Feren didn't look up from his plate, eating as though he hadn't seen food in years. Tauriel swallowed. Feren had always known of her love of mushrooms. "Thanks," she offered meekly.

He gave her a look, and continued to eat.

"I wonder what has become of Thranduil," Tauriel said. It wasn't really a question.

Feren looked up from his breakfast, a cherry tomato speared on his fork. "He should be enjoying the everlasting dawn of Valinor, I expect," he replied, trying to keep the resentment out of his voice. Tauriel heard it anyway.

"Feren," she said, spearing a cherry tomato of her own, "maybe we should sail to Valinor ourselves."

Feren began to stuff his mouth with lettuce rather aggressively. Tauriel suspected he was trying to keep himself from yelling at her.

"Five hundred years too late, I know," she continued. She hoped her words were as hopeful as she was trying to be. "But they are our kin. They might open the passage for us to go back." She chewed thoughtfully on a piece of rocket, and made a face at the bitterness in her mouth. "We could find a ship."

"You want to sail a ship?" said Feren. His cheeks were beginning to flush. "You think you can find a man-made ship that will last us the journey to Valinor? You think they will even allow us to come home?" He leaned forward in his seat, and Tauriel was stunned to realise there were tears in his eyes. "What makes you think Valinor is even our home anymore?" He got up abruptly and took his plate with him, disappearing through the doorway that led to the kitchen.

Tauriel took a deep breath, trying to fight the sadness rising in her throat. She had to keep trying with Feren. She owed it to him; he had not stopped trying with her these past few centuries. She popped another mushroom into her mouth and went after him.

"Feren!" she called. The corridors were spacious and silent. She marveled at how quickly he had escaped her. "Feren, could we at least talk about it?"

The kitchen he normally used was empty, but Tauriel spotted the plate on the countertop, now washed clean. He really moved fast. She realized, far too late, that she had no idea what Feren enjoyed doing in his own time. He looked after her, yes, fed her, made sure she kept clean and slept well, but what else did he do? Gardening? Reading? Looking at the stars? Tauriel made a face, annoyed at herself for assuming he did such stereotypically Silvan things. Then she remembered the smell of flowers in the early morning, and wondered if he was in the gardens. For the first time in a very long time, she would have to go outside.

Tauriel took the path outside to the main gardens, the gentle rush of the stream in her ears as she walked over the stone. Mirkwood was a place of calm beauty, and seeing it now, she felt like she was seeing it for the first time. Although it was slightly overgrown in some parts, and the stone was finally beginning to show signs of age, it was still Mirkwood, the place where she was born and had grown up. Tauriel felt a quiet peace creeping into her heart, filling the chasm that had opened up when Kili died. The world around her had continued to turn all this time – it was she who had stopped living. Perhaps it was time to try and live again. But first, she had to find her only companion, and hope he would consent to forgive her.

A movement in the distance caught her eye. The border of trees was still, but the bushes that lined them seemed to rustle of their own accord.

Before she was aware of it her hand had reached over her shoulder, for the quiver that wasn't there. She had stopped wearing her armour long ago, but her muscles would not forget their training. What could be down there? No one came by Mirkwood anymore – Thranduil had set protective enchantments over it before leaving, so that nothing and no one could invade it while she and Feren still inhabited it. Maybe it was that trader from Lake-town again; he had once met Feren in the forests outside Mirkwood and successfully sold him bacon (which Feren would dutifully cook and neither of them would eat).

Tauriel silently headed toward the bushes, picking up a fallen branch along the way. She could probably still kill it if it were an Orc. She might be wearing a glittery dress but she was also a warrior of Mirkwood, and she always had a blade hidden upon her person for times like these. Some habits were happily hard to break.

She watched the movement through the bushes. It was too small to be an Orc, too small to be a human even, unless a human child. But no human child would venture this far on its own. Tauriel held up the branch and drew herself to her full height.

"You," she said, in the best regal voice she could muster. "Show yourself."

There was a loud crack as the branches of the bush gave way, and the intruder fell through to land at her feet. Before he could get up she had backed away, shaking her head as though to clear her vision of the sight of him.

"No," she said. "No, no, no."

The intruder got to his feet. He stared at her for a moment, then forced off his helmet. She knew that helmet, that golden hair, the braids in his beard. She had seen it all when they buried him. His eyes were wide, his stare a little glassy, but she knew he recognized her as well.

"You," he said. It sounded accusing.

"They buried you," she whispered, her voice full of wonder. "Fili."

"Tauriel," he said, then shook his head as though he couldn't understand the sound. Tauriel knew his next words before he spoke them. "Kili? Where is Kili?"

"They buried you," she repeated. The chasm was returning. She could physically feel its jaws opening inside her. "They buried all of you."


End file.
